Rocks & Ridgetops
The Korean War: A Testing Ground
For Navy/USMC Helicopters
By OTTO KREISHER
Otto Kreisher is a reporter for Copley News Service.
Vietnam often is called "the helicopter war" because of the
major role rotary-wing aircraft played in that war. But nearly everything
that helicopters did in Vietnam had been tested in combat more than a
decade earlier--in Korea.
"There could be no doubt that the helicopter was the war's
foremost tactical innovation," concluded Lynn Montross, an historian
who wrote extensively about Korea.
The U.S. Navy and Marine Corps led that innovation, introducing
helicopters into the war virtually from the day they entered the conflict
in 1950.
The best known duties of the "pinwheels" or
"whirlybirds," as some bemused observers named them, were the
medical evacuation of wounded troops and the rescue of downed fliers,
often in enemy territory. The two services together conducted at least
11,000 such life-saving missions during the three-year war.
Helicopters also premiered in Korea the vital command-and-control and
logistical roles they later would play in Vietnam, and helped to direct
long-range artillery and naval gunfire. The Navy used them in
mine-clearing operations, and the Marines employed them increasingly as
troop carriers as the war dragged on.
All of these operations were carried out in rugged terrain and
frequently harsh weather, with machines that were underpowered and
extremely challenging to fly. "You wished you had an extra arm and
leg," recalls retired Lt. Cdr. Earl Bergsma, who flew Navy helos in
Korea.
A Long, Slow Gestation
Although helicopters are considered a late aviation development, the
first rotary-wing aircraft flew in 1907, just four years after the Wright
brothers' historic first flight. Functional helicopters evolved in the
1930s and some saw service in the U.S. and German armies late in World War
II.
A year after that war ended, the Navy established a helicopter
development squadron, VX-3, at Lakehurst, N.J. It was disestablished on 1
April 1948 and formed into two operational units: Helicopter Utility
Squadrons (HUs) One and Two.
Marine officers, concerned that the threat posed by atomic weapons
could preclude conventional amphibious operations, began to study the use
of the helicopter as an alternate way of getting ashore. The Marines
created their helicopter training and testing squadron, HMX-1, at
Quantico, Va., on 1 December 1947, and began working on the concept now
known as "vertical envelopment."
The three Navy and Marine Corps squadrons, with fewer than 250
qualified helicopter pilots and several dozen choppers, were available on
25 June 1950, when war erupted in Korea.
Most of the early helicopter pilots were veteran WWII fixed-wing
fliers. Some had volunteered to fly the strange new aircraft, but many had
not and had no idea what they were getting into. Retired Cdr. Harold R.
Gordinier said that switching to helicopters "was not my idea. ... I
didn't know there was such a thing.''
Primitive Better Than None
Within a month of North Korea's invasion of the south, units of the
U.S. Seventh Fleet, including the aircraft carriers USS Valley Forge and
USS Philippine Sea, were off the peninsula, providing support for the
retreating U.S. and Republic of Korea (ROK) ground troops. Each of the
carriers had assigned to it a helicopter detachment from HU-1, serving as
plane guard or "angel" to recover pilots who ended up in the
water.
Gordinier led the HU-1 detachment on the Valley Forge at the end of
1950; Chief Aviation Pilot Dan Fridley was the other pilot. They flew the
Sikorsky HO3S-1, "which was a pretty primitive version,"
Gordinier said. "But at that time, it was all we had."
The pioneer helo pilots said that the HO3Ss--and the Bell HTLs, also
flown in Korea--were unstable craft that required a pilot's full-time use
of both hands and both feet on the stick, the collective, and the rudder
pedals. "If you let go of the stick, it wanted to follow the [rotor]
blades around in a circle and would bang your knees," recalled
retired Cdr. Charles C. Jones, an HU-1 veteran of the war.
The center of gravity on those early choppers was so delicately
balanced that pilots carried steel bars, heavy rocks, or life rafts to
adjust the balance when there were no passengers in the back. The pilots
normally flew with an enlisted crewman, who operated the rescue hoist and,
frequently, had to jump into the frigid water to assist pilots into the
"horse collar" sling.
Raymond Swanecamp, who flew with an HU-1 detachment on the Valley Forge
as a radioman third class, said the crewmen were trained in water rescues
at the Underwater Demolition Team (UDT) school in Coronado, Calif. The
crewmen also helped the detachment's maintenance men care for the
helicopters, he said.
The carrier-based helos often would be dispatched from their plane
guard duties to recover downed fliers miles away.
Gordinier, who served on the British carrier HMS Theseus after Valley
Forge returned to CONUS (the Continental United States), recalled one
rescue of two British fliers "behind the lines in the Yellow
Sea."
Because of the HO3S's center-of-gravity problem, he had to pick them up
one at a time and take them to the beach, then stow the life rafts in the
cargo hold so he could carry both men back to the carrier.
Spotting, Dripping, and Clearing
Helicopters also were assigned to some cruisers and battleships and
were used to spot for the big guns. Bergsma served on USS St. Paul and
remembered a number of missions trying to direct the heavy cruiser's
eight-inch guns against trains and railroad tunnels along the North Korean
coast, and being shot at by North Korean soldiers.
Jones, who flew from several cruisers in the 1950-51 time frame, said
the pilots received a very short course in gun spotting at Coronado before
deploying. But mainly "we learned as we went," he said.
A 1950 Navy report found that a ship "using its own helo and
carrying its own spotting officer possessed one of the best assets to
accurate marksmanship that ... [it] could have."
The small helo detachments were close-knit teams, but often had trouble
fitting in on the surface warships. "We really were kind of a pain in
the rear on the ships," Jones said. "They didn't like us. ... We
would drip oil on their deck. But when we started doing rescues, they
liked us a lot better."
Swanecamp has fond memories of his time with the HU-1 detachment. When
a small detachment of men "lives and works together like we
did," he said, "it makes for a great relationship."
Navy helicopters debuted as part of the mine-clearing forces during the
attempted amphibious landing at Wonsan, in September and October 1950.
Their capability was demonstrated unintentionally when the cruiser USS
Helena's helo pilot, Lt. Harry W. Swineborne, photographed two moored
mines while searching for survivors of a sunken minehunter in Wonsan
harbor.
Lt. B.D. Pennington, the cruiser USS Worcester's helicopter pilot,
spotted more mines a few days later and soon thereafter the helos played a
key role in the recurrent mine-clearing duties in Wonsan and other Korean
ports. Some helicopter crewmen tried to destroy floating mines with rifle
fire. But that was discouraged after mine explosions nearly knocked one
helo out of the sky.
Helicopters saved several minesweeping ships by spotting mines in their
path or by directing them out of a mine field. "The helicopters had
many friends in the minesweeps," said Lt. Cdr. I.M. Laird, skipper of
the minehunter Dextrous, one of the ships guided to safety.
Angels to the Rescue
Navy helicopters operating in Wonsan harbor frequently flew from old
tank landing ships, including LST 799, which had been fitted with a helo
landing platform. Although the helos were assigned to the ship primarily
for minespotting duties, they "got more and more into the role of
rescue ... as time went on," said Lt. T.E. Houston, a former
commanding officer of LST 799.
Helicopters flying from 799 saved 22 fliers, and choppers from the
Japanese-manned LST Q-007 took part in other heroic rescues.
On 3 July 1950, Lt. (j.g). John K. Koelsch and his crewman, Aviation
Structural Mechanic Third Class George M. Neal, flew off Q-007 and were
shot down while trying to recover a Marine pilot in the mountains. After
evading enemy soldiers for nine days, the helicopter crew and the Marine
pilot were captured. Koelsch died in captivity but was awarded the Medal
of Honor posthumously for his rescue attempt and for "inspiring his
fellow prisoners by his fortitude and consideration for others."
Bergsma and then-Lt. (j.g). John W. Thornton were involved in another
heroic effort, flying from Wonsan on 31 March 1951 to recover four Army
Rangers and 20 South Korean soldiers on a reconnaissance mission deep
behind enemy lines. Thornton's helicopter crashed when he attempted a
pickup on a mountaintop in heavy turbulence while under intense enemy
fire. Nonetheless, he still was able to help Bergsma and another chopper
pilot pick up three of the Rangers, but was then captured and spent more
than two years as a POW. He received the Navy Cross for his actions.
Many other Navy helicopter pilots and crewmen were decorated for
bravery during the war.
From Pusan to Chosin
The first Marine helos in the war were four HO3Ss; their crews and
mechanics had transferred from HMX-1 to Marine Observation Squadron (VMO)
Six when the latter unit deployed to Korea in July 1950.
The squadron flew into the besieged Pusan Perimeter on 2 August at
about the same time that the "grunts" of the First Provisional
Marine Brigade were disembarking there. The next day, the brigade
commander, Brig. Gen. Edward Craig, flew by helicopter to give orders to
his battalion commanders on the march, to pick a site for his command
post, and to confer with his Army superiors.
That flight, Montross wrote, "marked the dawn of a new era in
command and control."
If the Marines had not had helicopters available, Craig said, "I
do not believe we would have had the success we did."
A VMO-6 helicopter rescued a downed Marine flier the following day, the
first of scores they would save. The Marine helos also evacuated
casualties and carried water and light supplies of all kinds to ridgetop
positions--crucial service in the hilly terrain and intense heat. The
VMO-6 helos also laid telephone wires between units, unreeling the wire at
a mile a minute from makeshift rigs carried beneath the aircraft. In
minutes they could put down lines over rugged terrain that would have
taken men on foot several days to cross.
Because a stretcher would not fit in the HO3S's small cabin, the glass
was removed from the rear windows and the litter was more or less
"stuffed" in, with the casualty's legs usually protruding into
the wind. By early 1951, the HO3Ss were being replaced by the small
bubble-canopy HTLs, which could carry a shielded stretcher on each of
their two skids.
Many of the fragile helicopters were shot down during their lifesaving
missions.
The choppers played a major role during the First Marine Division's
advance to--and later fighting withdrawal from--the Chosin Reservoir,
helping to link the widely separated regiments.
The VMO-6 helos did not restrict their services to their fellow
Marines; they also rescued a number of Air Force and Navy pilots.
The Marines also flew liaison missions for Maj. Gen. Edward Almond, the
Army's X Corps commander, and evacuated numerous Army casualties. The Army
soon became convinced of the helicopters' value and started the process
that brought their own helos into the war.
Although the helicopters flown in Korea had few instruments and were
not certified for night flying, the Marines conducted more than 1,000
night-medevac missions during the war.
Craig had recommended early in the war that the Marines bring in larger
helicopters with greater airlift capacity. That goal was accomplished when
Marine Helicopter Transport Squadron (HMR) 161 flew its 15 HRS-1s into
Pusan on 2 September 1951.
A Healthy Blend
Of Power and Character
Each of the Sikorsky-made choppers could carry a load of 1,500 pounds
with a crew of two. "They were a cut above the original helos. They
were good choppers," said retired Col. John Carey, who flew with
HMR-161 in 1952-53. "They could carry ... about eight fully equipped
Marines."
Retired Col. Virgil Olson, who was in the squadron about the same time,
said that the big helicopters "didn't have the power we would have
liked to have had. ... Sometimes it took a little more character to stay
in the air."
The squadron quickly proved its capability, conducting the first-ever
mass helicopter resupply mission on 13 September. In 28 flights, HMR-161
transported 18,848 pounds of gear and 74 Marines into a ridgeline
position. One week later, it conducted the first major combat troop
movement by helicopter, hauling 224 Marines of the Recon Company and
17,772 pounds of supplies to a remote hilltop. Still later, on 11 October,
the squadron flew a battalion of the 7th Marines to the mountainous battle
line and lifted out a battalion of the 5th Marines.
Even bigger movements of troops and supplies would follow, including
one lift--on 23-27 February 1953--of 1.6 million pounds of cargo to
resupply two regiments for five days.
Less than a month after arriving in-theater, HMR-161 tried a nighttime
resupply mission. The devices used to mark the landing zone were not
effective, however, and there was no second attempt of that mission during
the war. But the squadron did join VMO-6 in evacuating casualties at
night. "We felt appreciated, and needed, and pretty much used up to
our capability," Olson said. "Talk to some of the guys who were
night-medevaced to hospital ships. I think they appreciated us."
Carey said he led the first mission that used helicopters to relocate a
battery of rocket launchers to avoid enemy counterfire. The launchers
"kicked up an awful lot of dust when they fired," he said.
"We had to get them out of there, and we did." His unit actually
moved the battery twice, Carey said, carrying the crews inside and the
four launchers and extra rockets slung beneath their choppers.
Although mentioned only infrequently in the histories of the Korean
War, the Navy and Marine choppers performed a number of vital missions,
paving the way for the much more important role helicopters would play in
the next Asian conflict in which U.S. troops would be involved. *
The editors express their appreciation to Presidio Press Inc. (www.presidiopress.com)
for permission to reproduce the photographs appearing on pages 54 and 55
from Korea 1950-1953, A Pictorial History, by D.M. Giangreco. This
comprehensive pictorial history of the Korean War was republished in 2000.
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